‘I love thee to the depth, breadth and height my soul can reach.’

Its WEDDING season and we are diligently creating the bespoke gowns for all our lovely brides getting married in the following months of spring and summer! Winter has gone by, but left some memorable moments at the studio! One of these special journeys we have to share today on the blog.

It’s the winter wonderful wedding of Marli and Steyn Basson on the 16th of July, during the Bastille Festival, in Franschoek. We quote Nicola of The Prettyblog, whom recently featured the wedding – ‘…Franschhoek was really busy, and there were loads of people. They were all in a very festive mood, which was great! There were a bunch of curious people watching Marli as she got out of the car, it felt a little like a celebrity wedding…’ Their wedding day was the PERFECT summers day in the middle of winter!

Marli excitedly contacted us in April 2011 after her sister-in-law Nicola insisted that she should come for a consultation! We loved meeting with this exciting bride-to-be! She’s an absolute treat, with her sparkly, sincere and humble personality! We enjoyed every moment of the process as she totally handed the task of creating her DREAM GOWN to us as designers! Marli’s only objective was that she wanted a dress that is elegantly classic with a dramatic twist.

The design process was so much fun! We combined line, form, colour and texture. Revealing an one-of-a-kind creation that exceeded expectations! The fabric combination was a dove grey silk, with silver lurex Chantilly lace, French Chantilly with intricately embellished corded lace appliqués running into a full flare bridal tulle bottom with narrow scallop lace trim. We applied some colouring techniques to the bridal veiling for fluidity of the design! For a fun element we added a dark grey satin ribbon with a vintage brooch Marli got from her grandmother.

The LOVE STORY: Steyn was involved in the planning of the Impossible Journey. While searching for someone on Facebook regarding the planning of the event, he stumbled across a picture of me. Seeing that we only have one mutual friend, Steyn contacted her and asked if she could put in a good word for him. At first I wasn’t too keen on meeting a total stranger, but Jana convinced me to have coffee with him!

Steyn: I really wanted to meet Marli, but it took time and sweet talk! Eventually she gave in and we met at Melissa’s for coffee one Sunday afternoon in April. We chatted for more than four hours and I immediately fell in love with her. I knew we were going to get married and that I need to approach this the right way. A month later I bought a bunch of her favourite flowers and headed to her house. I asked her to be my girlfriend and she,very shyly, said yes.